I have my own suggestion for Mr. Obama as he prepares for his State of the Union address: Instead of knifing your allies, try fighting for the principles of your party. It’s true, that’s not what Mr. Clinton did. But it’s what Franklin Roosevelt did, and Harry Truman, and John Kennedy—and it worked for them. In those days, “working-class revolts” helped Democrats, not Republicans.
Last year’s dream of bipartisanship was an attractive one, but it should be clear to you by now that you will never win over the GOP. As you gaze over their contemptuous faces tonight, wondering what clever insults they will spontaneously blurt as you pause to take a breath, try to remember that, for the most part, they are not your friends; that many of them took the financial crisis as a signal to dedicate themselves even more wholeheartedly to the laissez-faire superstition. You cannot appease these zealots. No one can.
What you need to do now is pick a fight, preferably one that forces the obstructionists of the right to take the side of privilege. You need a battle that will expose their populism and their protest for the pretenses they are. Your target is obvious: the financial industry, from Wall Street to the credit card companies. Yes, taking them on will cost you campaign contributions for 2012, but take Wall Street down a few pegs and Americans might start to remember what it was their grandparents loved about Democrats all those years ago.
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